Chapter 13

CHAPTER 13

ELODIE

The world shook and trembled. Flames leaped up around her and Elodie shied back, raising her hands to protect herself.

She had never needed to protect herself before. Not from the Aurum.

But here, here in this place of dreams and nightmares, everything was different.

What have you done?

The voice boomed through the Sanctum, shaking the stones themselves.

Done? She had done nothing. She could do nothing. The power she had managed to steal in order to help Finnian and Hestia escape had vanished now and she was lost again. Flames surrounded her and light beat down on her relentlessly, and she was helpless before it.

For a moment she had been free, and part of her had been everywhere, in the wind and the water, in the earth itself. She had sensed them – Finn and Hestia hurtling through the shadows as they travelled by the dark ways of magic, just as she had once travelled through the light; Roland, travelling through a tangle of ancient forest, his sombre mood tearing at her heart; and Wren…terrified and confused, with the darkness closing in all around her.

But then the flames surrounded Elodie again, dragging her back into this prison between the worlds of life and death.

The Aurum was furious.

‘Why are you doing this?’ Elodie asked, her voice shaking. If it was really her voice. Her mind needed to create a reality around her, to keep the fragile threads of her sanity intact. Or so she believed. So she saw the chamber of the Aurum, the Sacrum, and she felt herself there in body as well as mind, even if she knew her body lay still and silent in a bedchamber, as helpless there as she was here.

If anyone had a mind to do away with her now, she wouldn’t be able to defend herself. She would be lost.

She was lost.

Rage ripped through her again and she forced herself up from her knees. This was not happening. She would not allow it to happen. The Aurum was powerful and determined, she knew that of old, but so was she.

‘Who has done this?’ she yelled. ‘Who is behind it all? You have to know. You’re meant to know everything!’

That was what she had always been told. That was what the Aurum wanted her and everyone else to believe.

A figure formed before her, one made of flickering light, candle flames and stars, reflections on glass and polished silver. There were no features to be discerned, not really. They were fleeting and quick, moments caught in the light.

The Aurum. She was looking directly at the Aurum and it was trying to take a form with which to…what, communicate? Fight?

Elodie , it said and the voice was a sigh of regret and loss, echoes of her mother, and her grandmother perhaps. Elodie, what have you done? Why do you still defy us?

Another trick, another ploy. It had to be. This sympathy was nothing like she had faced so far.

‘I have to,’ she replied. ‘You can’t just demand?—’

Of course we can. There was a sigh which made the world around her shake. Or maybe it was just her. The sound rattled through her body. Perhaps we were mistaken. Perhaps you were not the one after all. I should find another to be my sword, my Chosen. My champion.

The figure shimmered and changed. Not her mother this time, not a woman at all.

Roland.

But not Roland either. His dark eyes were alive with fire and light. He smiled, but that was not his smile.

‘Stop this,’ Elodie told it. ‘You can’t.’

There is nothing to stop me. He has vowed to serve me, and he has not broken his vows.

Not like she had, it meant.

‘He stood against you to defend Wren. He will always stand against?—’

A blast of light lashed out, striking her in the stomach and sending her folding back on herself. She didn’t even see where it came from but that hardly mattered. She knew the source. Roland’s image dissolved again and for that brief respite she was grateful. She couldn’t look at him like that. It wasn’t real, she had to remind herself. None of that was real.

Except it felt real. Far too real.

With a snarl of frustration, Elodie tried to drag herself back to her feet again, to take control of her emotions and find something real to cling to.

Roland, she thought. There was still Roland. And he still loved her.

Just as she still loved him.

The Aurum laughed, reading her thoughts. A horrible, mocking laughter and, for the first time, great light and shades of old, she hated it. It had tried to control her all her life. It had dictated what she did and when. She had given up everything to protect it and now…now it laughed. Laughed at her emotions, her love. How dare it? Perhaps him, perhaps…not?

The child of the Nox is weak , it told her and her anger faltered at this change of tack. She falters. Perhaps she will serve me instead. That is what you told her to do, is it not?

Her own voice rang out in this bright and empty place, rebounding off the edges and coming back to taunt her. ‘ Always reach for the light, Wren. Promise me. ’

No, Wren was her own person and always would be. Elodie had to believe that. Wren would hold true and would not give in to these petty, jealous powers.

Because that was all they were. She could see it now. Warring factions, like children fighting over a toy. The Nox and the Aurum had been made from old magic but they didn’t have a fraction of its power or its patience.

‘Wren is stronger than you know.’

So you hope. She is already failing. Better she serve me than the Nox, surely? If you tell her to obey, to submit, she will and what a queen she will be in your stead, a creature of glory and power, ruling both these mortal kingdoms, all magic bending to obey her. The old magic has taken an interest in her as well. It is seeking her out. As our incarnation she will be worthy of worship. That’s what mortals really want, Elodie. Someone to love, to serve, to adore. They will follow her.

‘The Nox created her,’ Elodie tried to argue, hoping that the very idea would protect Wren from the Aurum, that it would be too disgusted to be truly tempted.

Even my enemy’s tool can be of use in my hands. She is susceptible, and vulnerable. Now more than ever. She has lost everything. Yes, I think perhaps she will do. If not, if she prefers to burn, there are others. You are not special. Not anymore. You made your choice, hedge witch.

Those last two words were a curse.

The light swirled like a storm before her, and Elodie felt it growing, expanding, reaching out of this prison. For a moment the light was everywhere, burning through her and scourging her flesh. She cried out, her voice echoing here and somewhere else, somewhere beyond her own world. Into the ways beyond, where she had flung the Nox, and into the paths of light that she used to travel.

And then the Aurum was gone.

We live in the light of the Aurum , she had always been taught. Now the Aurum itself had abandoned her.

Elodie sank down, her body without strength, without hope, lost in the emptiness.